A common type of telecopier comprises a facsimile modem. Such a modem forms part of a personal computer or a computer network and provides telecopier functionality--sending electronic "telecopies" and receiving same. Electronic telecopies can be printed or transmitted to a telecopier. Some facsimile software provides optical character recognition to convert electronic telecopies (images) into electronic text. A facsimile modem is similar to a telecopier and can receive telecopies from a telecopier or transmit telecopies to a telecopier; however, a facsimile modem may lack a scanner or a printer.
A common method of transmitting electronic binary files uses a modem and a common communications protocol such as X-Modem or Z-Modem. In order to employ such a common communication protocol, a certain level of sophistication is desirable. Further, user intervention at both a transmitting and a receiving end are generally necessary.
In an attempt to overcome these problems, networks have been created. Such networks provide file copying and file access on a "server"--a central computer with electronic file storage. Such servers often pose the greatest security risk to computer networks and as such, dial up access to servers connected to a computer network is often limited or unavailable. Alternatively, where dial up access is provided, confidential information is not accessible and is not to be transferred using the server.
The use of telecopiers commonly referred to as facsimile machines is wide spread. Whereas several years ago, telecopiers were to be found in up-scale businesses and document based businesses, telecopiers can now be found in homes, hotels, small offices, brief cases, cars, personal digital assistants, and mailbox service stores. Telecopier transmissions can be sent via phone lines or via cellular and other wireless technologies.
The widespread use of telecopiers and facsimile modems has resulted in a general acceptance and understanding of their use. One such use of telecopiers is to transmit the content of physical documents and notes. These documents may be handwritten, those received from other sources or those which a sender does not wish a receiver to acquire as electronic text (or where the user does not know how to send an electronic file). These documents may be personal and/or confidential. Unfortunately, when the receiving telecopier is located at a hotel or in a mailbox service store, such confidentiality is lost. Further, when the document is to be sent from a mailbox service provider, the document is visible to said provider and to others using the service. Also, when a telecopy is transmitted to a facsimile modem residing in a server, such a telecopy is may be subject to unauthorized retrieval.
Presently, many offices have files stored electronically and on paper which are difficult to manage and, more importantly, are not truly equivalent. From the electronic files, a copy of the paper documents is generated through printing; however, from the paper documents, it is time consuming and difficult to generate electronic files. Further, it is often desirable to limit access to paper files. This is currently done using physical locking mechanisms. The disadvantages become apparent when access to some files is to be provided to several people while other files are only accessible to a subset and further files to a different group of people. File systems of this type are difficult to secure and often requires a person to maintain security.
Telecopiers have several conveniences over other forms of communication. A telecopy is a physical document likened to a letter. A telecopier can be programmed to send telecopies on a delayed schedule; this allows a user to take advantage of less expensive communication times. A telecopier receives telecopies absent user intervention. This last convenience is significant. Further, a telecopier functions independent of other electronic devices.
Many companies and individuals use telecopiers which are common to more than one person. Such telecopiers are often accessible to a number of people and may even be located in public areas. The ability to send a secure telecopy to such a telecopier is desirable.
In an attempt to overcome this problem, an apparatus is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,491,563 by Pomerantz. The apparatus scrambles the visible telecopy to render it more difficult to read. Alignment indications are also transmitted with the scrambled telecopy in order to facilitate accurate re-assembly. Such scrambling suffers from several disadvantages. First, it suffers from data loss, printing errors, feed problems, and communication errors which are further aggravated by subsequent scanning, copying, telecopying. Second, it is applicable only to visual gray scale images.
In a further attempt to overcome this problem, an apparatus and method is described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,321,749 and 5,398,283 by Virga. The method comprises encrypting a bitmap of the image to be transmitted and transmitting the encrypted information as a series of marks indicative of "ones" and "zeros." From these marks, the encrypted bitmap is reconstructed, decrypted and capable of being printed as a telecopy. Alignment marks are placed at opposing ends of each line to compensate for misaligned transmissions. Such a telecopy is neither legible nor decipherable. Such scrambling suffers from several disadvantages. First, it suffers from data loss, printing errors, feed problems, and communication errors which are further aggravated by subsequent scanning, copying, telecopying. Second, it is applicable only to visual gray scale images.
It would be advantageous to provide means of storing electronic files as printed documents.
Further, it would be advantageous to provide means of sending electronic files from a facsimile modem to a telecopier or to another facsimile modem.